"Youth Prioritize Income Over Public Service, Prefer Large Corporations When Choosing Careers"

Statistics Korea 2023 Survey Results: 'Income' Ranks First
Preference for Large Companies at Work... Income Over Stability

Among adolescents, 3 out of 10 consider income the most important factor when choosing a job. Along with this, the preferred workplace is also shifting from public servants to large corporations.

According to the '2023 Social Survey' released by Statistics Korea on the 18th, 35.7% of adolescents aged 13 to 19 answered that income is the most important factor when choosing a job. Aptitude and interest (30.6%), stability (16.0%), growth and future prospects (4.9%), and honor and reputation (4.5%) followed.

The data was compiled from a survey conducted over 16 days from May 17 to June 1 this year, targeting about 36,000 household members aged 13 and older residing in approximately 19,000 sample households nationwide, covering welfare, social participation, leisure, income and consumption, and labor sectors.

Ten years ago, in 2013, aptitude and interest ranked first at 38.1%, while income and stability were 25.5% and 18.6%, respectively. Comparing the share of income between 2013 and this year, it increased by 10.2 percentage points (p) over ten years, whereas aptitude and interest decreased by 7.5%p. Stability and fulfillment/self-realization also decreased by 2.6%p and 3.4%p, respectively.

Aptitude and interest, which held the top position until 2017, lost its place to income in 2019.

Following this trend, the workplace preferences of teenagers are also changing. In the past, there was a tendency to prefer public servants due to their high stability, but in this year's survey on the types of workplaces preferred by teenagers (aged 13 to 18), large corporations ranked first at 31.4%. The second place was government agencies (19.2%), followed by professionals (11.9%), public enterprises (11.3%), and startups or self-employment (10.8%).

In 2013, government agencies ranked first (29.7%), large corporations were second (24.2%), and public enterprises were third (12.7%). Over the past ten years, the share of large corporations increased by 7.2%p, while government agencies decreased by 10.5%p.

Experts analyze that this phenomenon is related to economic conditions. Kim Kiheon, head of the Youth Policy Research Office at the Korea Youth Policy Institute, said, “When the economic situation worsens, the need for money increases, leading to a tendency to emphasize it. Korea’s labor market has a dual structure, with a large wage gap between large corporations and small and medium-sized enterprises, which results in a concentration on large corporations.”

Regarding the decline in preference for public servant positions, he added that it is influenced by the scale of recruitment, saying, “Recently, the trend is to reduce the number of public servant positions, making it harder to become a public servant, so the preference is decreasing.”